


the first song for your mix tape

by ghosthunter



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Battle of the Bands, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-15
Updated: 2017-06-15
Packaged: 2018-11-14 14:58:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11210445
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghosthunter/pseuds/ghosthunter
Summary: Bold black letters announce the year's battle of the bands. Their school hosts one every fall, and the flyer lists the date and times for sign ups. Nicky leaves it laying on his desk and climbs back into bed. He slips his phone out from beneath his pillow and checks his text messages.He only has one.BOTB!!!! )))))))))))





	the first song for your mix tape

**Author's Note:**

> Whatever, here's some purely self-indulgent frat boy/battle of the bands/college AU nonsense that probably should've been named "Freebird" for the sheer number of times it's mentioned. Please enjoy.
> 
> ty to Megan for the beta. You're a real bro, bro.

On Thursday, Nicky wakes up to someone slipping a flyer underneath the dorm room door. It's too early for him to want to get out of bed, but the lack of movement from the bunk above his seems to indicate the noise didn't wake Marcus. He rolls out of bed and shuffles over to the door, picking up the neon pink sheet of paper that's been slipped under.

Bold black letters announce the year's battle of the bands. Their school hosts one every fall, and the flyer lists the date and times for sign ups. Nicky leaves it laying on his desk and climbs back into bed. He slips his phone out from beneath his pillow and checks his text messages.

He only has one. _BOTB!!!! )))))))))))_

He manages to stifle the groan he wants to make and tosses his phone back onto the bed.

The year before, they made it all the way to the end of the series before losing in the finals. Nicky would almost prefer not to go through it again - they play in a lot of local bars now, banking off the recognition they've gained from making it to the finals. But of course, he's not the sole decision maker - he never was.

He rolls over and buries his face in his pillow and groans. 

 

  
"We have to go sign up," Alex tells him. He's sitting cross-legged on the floor of the basement of his frat house, their official practice space, at least until Alex graduates and they have to figure out another plan. Or break up. Nicky thinks the latter seems more likely.

Nicky's tuning his guitar, slumped against an amp. The others haven't arrived yet, and mid-afternoon, the frat house is nearly empty. "Do you really want to?"

"Of course," Alex tells him. "We get redemption arc."

Nicky rolls his eyes. "That's not -" Nicky stops himself, then sighs. "If the others go for it, then fine."

He knows that Alex will count this as a win, because it basically is. Nicky knows going in that TJ is absolutely going to agree - he didn't play with them last year, but Sasha did. That is, before he transferred schools at the end of fall semester and left them hanging with no bassist for all of winter break and half the spring semester before one of Alex's frat brothers brought TJ home and they found out he could play. He doesn't have the memory of last year's finals hanging over his head.

Braden takes convincing, but Nicky knows that as soon as Alex starts talking, Braden's going to give in. He doesn't really care if they're playing battle of the bands gigs or gigs where they get paid in beer and pizza. Nicky would rather take the beer and pizza than the thought of jumping through all the hoops only to flame out again on the last night. He just thinks it's a waste of time, is all.

But Braden shrugs and says, "okay," and Alex lets out a whoop of joy, and it's on. Fine, then. If they're going to do this, Nicky's going to make sure that it's not a waste of their time.

 

  
They play for 20 people (at least ten of them Alex's frat brothers) that Friday night at the shitty bar across the street from the good pizza place. It's too hot and Nicky's hair is stuck to his face by the end of their second song and TJ keeps having to turn around to face Braden because there's one couple grinding on the bar's pathetic dance floor and he's laughing so hard he's about to choke.

It's not helping that between every song one of Alex's brothers - Carlson, the one who brought TJ to them in the first place - keeps yelling "Freebird!" This also makes TJ laugh, and Alex is ignoring the looks that Nicky keeps throwing him.

"Ask me to play Freebird one more fucking time," Nicky threatens once they're off the stage and he has a beer in his hand. He tries to make it sound like he's joking but it comes out with an edge. TJ laughs and wraps an arm around Carlson's waist from behind.

"Osh'll play it for me," Carlson says. He's a lot more drunk than Nicky is.

"He plays bass," Nicky says. "It'll be a fucking fantastic rendition."

Carlson laughs, oblivious to Nicky's bared-teeth smile. Part of being on edge is Carlson being annoying, and another part of it is having to watch him and TJ hang all over each other while they're standing at the bar. He turns away from them, leaning back against the bar. It's crowded with frat bros and he stands there, watching Alex cackling at something Kuznetsov has just told him. Even Marcus is standing with them. Nicky's pretty sure he wouldn't come out if he weren't Nicky's roommate and somehow obligated to be there.

"Saw you signed up for battle of the bands," someone says to his left. He turns back, not having realized that TJ and Carlson had gone. Standing next to him now is Sidney Crosby. "I figured after last year you wouldn't."

Crosby's on the student events committee, so he would know who had already signed up. It's also his band that beat Nicky and Alex's in the finals the year before. Nicky probably wouldn't hate him, but Nicky's already in a bad mood.

"Why not?" Nicky asks. Then he holds up his hand to stop any answer Crosby might have. "I don't actually care what your answer is. Why are you here?"

"Checking out the competition," Crosby says, and shrugs. "I wanted to see if you were any better than last year or if we could beat you again that easily."

"Isn't it a conflict of interest for you to be on the activities committee and your band still be entered?" Nicky asks.

"If the other guys were on the committee, they wouldn't let us play. It's not like I'm a judge or anything," Crosby says, and sips his beer. Nicky wants to knock the bottle through Crosby's teeth, which says a lot more about Nicky's mental state than anything else.

He turns away from Crosby very deliberately and walks toward Alex. "Alex," he says, raising his voice over the music thumping through the PA system. "I'm heading out. Do you need help moving equipment?" All their gear is spread between the back of Alex's car or Braden's jeep. Nicky usually catches a ride with them back to the frat and helps unload, but he feels like maybe he's got a headache coming on.

"Can get one of the pledges to unload it," Alex says.

"Do you want me to come with you?" Marcus asks, frowning, and Nicky appreciates the concern but Marcus has a full glass in one hand and Nicky would prefer to just be alone for a while so he can sulk in private and get it out of his system.

Nicky shakes his head. "No, don't worry about it," Nicky says, shaking his head. He puts his nearly empty bottle down on the table near them. "I'll see you in the morning." He turns to head toward the door.

"Night!" he hears Marcus and Kuznetsov yell after him, and flaps a hand through the air in acknowledgement as he heads toward the doors.

It's still too hot and sticky outside, but it's not that far to walk back to the dorm. He's almost to the end of the block when he hears Alex yelling "Wait!" behind him. He stops and turns back to look.

"Come on, let me give you ride home," Alex says to him. He reaches out and wraps his fingers around Nicky's wrist, tugging gently. His fingers are cold from being wrapped around his beer.

"I can walk," he says.

"I know, but we talk if you come with me. And you been in bad mood since we have practice," Alex says. He tugs again, and Nicky lets himself be pulled forward, back to the other end of the block to wrap around to the bar's lot and Alex's car.

He slumps into the passenger seat and waits for Alex to start the car, starling when the radio comes on full blast. Alex reaches out and quickly punches the button to turn it off. "So why you in bad mood?" he asks.

Nicky sighs and pushes his damp hair off his face, leaning against the window. "I hate losing," he says. "And I'd be in less of a shitty mood if Sidney fucking Crosby weren't coming and hanging out at our gigs."

"Did not notice," Alex says, looking over at Nicky. "Don't pay attention to him. Too boring."

"Oh sure, except apparently they're entering again," Nicky says.

"We fuck up last year. We don't fuck up again," Alex says with a shrug, like it's a foregone conclusion. "That make you mad at Carly and Osh too, or that something else?"

"No one should have to see that," Nicky says.

"Just because you lonely doesn't mean anyone else can't be happy. Is your choice to be alone, anyway," Alex says like it's the most simple, logical thing in the world. Which Nicky guesses is fair, but he's not lonely. He just can't have what he wants.

What he wants is sitting next to him in the car, looking at him seriously, face half-shadowed by the lights from the front doors of Nicky's dorm. And sure, maybe the band is nothing and it will all end after college, but he doesn't want to compromise that just because he also wants to kiss Alex Ovechkin right on his stupid mouth.

The car is idling at the entrance of the building, and Alex is waiting for him to say something or leave. "Don't hurt yourself moving equipment," Nicky finally says, then opens the door. Alex sighs heavily as Nicky closes the door, then opens the back to grab his guitar before heading inside.

 

He sleeps too late in the morning and wakes up to find that he's alone in the room. That's fine. He's not interested in questioning Marcus's choices, and he'd really rather be alone for a while anyway. He thinks about what Alex said, about being alone, and he thinks about the way Alex's fingers were cold on his wrist when he grabbed Nicky to stop him on the sidewalk.

He thinks about the stupid battle of the bands and how badly he suddenly wants them to win.

He rolls out of bed and texts Alex. They're doing this, and they're going to kick Sidney's ass this time. It's nearly noon, so they agree to meet for lunch. They're playing again that night - they play most Friday and Saturday nights, thanks to making it to the final of the battle the year before. It's great, but there's a cash prize and a recording session that goes to the winner. And Nicky wants to be the winner.

"We need a game plan," Nicky tells Alex, once they're sat at a table in the back of the burrito place a few blocks from campus.

"Sure," Alex says agreeably. He's always more agreeable when there's a burrito bowl in front of him.

"What songs get the best reactions from people? What songs do we think are best? Where's the overlap," Nicky continues. Alex nods, shoveling food into his mouth like no one ever feeds him. Probably not many of the guys in the house can cook.

"Maybe we learn Freebird," Alex says. Nicky almost chokes on his burrito.

"Okay, first of all," he says, once he's cleared his throat, "I'm not fucking playing Freebird. I don't care how many times Carlson yells it and I don't care if Oshie knows it. It's like half an hour long and that would be our entire set."

"Is not that long," Alex says, shrugging.

" _No_ ," Nicky says. "Besides, we're not supposed to do covers."

"Fine," Alex says. "How you gonna figure out what songs we do?"

"Pay attention to what people seem to like best," Nicky says.

"You gonna take notes during set?" Alex asks him.

"Well, obviously not. Make one of your pledges do it. Or. I don't know. I'll make Jojo do it. He owes me for covering him when the RA almost busted us with booze in the room," Nicky says.

"You're a rebel," Alex tells him.

"He's bad at being sneaky," Nicky says. Alex nods, because it's true. He finishes the last of his burrito and gets up to clear his trash. "Come on," he says to Alex. "Let's go figure out a set list. There's four rounds of this shit."

 

  
Alex must say something to Carlson about the yelling, because he doesn't even mention it until the band comes off the stage on Saturday night, and even then, all he says is, "you should've played Freebird," but only to TJ, who just laughs and kisses him before stealing his beer and chugging it. Nicky rolls his eyes and orders beers for himself and Alex. Once they're sufficiently refreshed, they head over to where Marcus and Kuznetsov are huddled together over a notebook, discussing ... something.

Turns out, it's actually the set list they've played, with careful notations of how people reacted to the songs that were played. They have a month before they're going to have to play in the first round of the battle, so that gives them around three weeks worth of Friday and Saturday gigs to decide what songs are best.

"You make Kuzya help?" Alex asks, leaning over the table to look at the notes. Some of them are scribbled in Russian - Kuznetsov's contributions.

"If he was gonna stand here," Marcus says, then shrugs. There are several empty glasses scattered across the table in front of them.

"It doesn't help me if I can't read it," Nicky says, frowning at the notes. It's hard to tell where they go from here with just one night's worth of data. Nicky has to laugh at himself - he knows fuck-all about science and data. He's into architecture. Alex is the one who does science.

"Not for you," Kuznetsov says, nudging the paper toward Alex and picking up his drink. Alex turns the paper so that he can read what's written, and laughs.

"What?" Nicky asks.

"Not for you," Alex says.

"I hate both of you," he says, tipping his beer up, He's almost smiling. Almost.

Marcus finishes his drink and hands the notebook to Nicky. "You're lucky I like you, because I have to work early in the morning," he says. "I'll see you later. Or tomorrow."

"I'll walk with you," Kuznetsov says. "No early morning, but slept bad last night. Could use sleep."

Alex is shaking his head at them. "See you tomorrow night," he says, taking his beer and winding away from them to find something better to do. Kuznetsov waves at them as they head for the door.

Nicky looks down at the notebook Marcus shoved into his hands. Sure, most of what's written there is in English, with Kuznetsov's comments in lines of neat Cyrillic. At the very bottom is one message, written just for Nicky in his own native language.

_Just fucking kiss him already, you're killing me._

Nicky hopes no one else, especially not Alex, has noticed.

 

  
By the time they actually play their first battle, Marcus has put together an entire spreadsheet of songs rated by how much their audience of Alex's frat brothers seem to like them. He's even enlisted Kuznetsov to survey the house to find out which songs the brothers liked best to help rank them.

And Nicky has absolutely not kissed Alex, or even considered that it would be possible. He thinks about it, though. He thinks about it a lot, and Marcus keeps catching him watching Alex, and smirking. He wants to win the battle, he can't risk screwing things up just because he wants to shove Alex against a wall and kiss him until neither of them can breathe.

Two bands go through from each preliminary round, the first and second highest scores. Everything is judges scores combined with crowd applause, which Nicky thinks is a shitty metric, because that makes it depend on how many friends each band has. Fortunately for them, Alex is able to rally his entire frat to show up and cheer them on.

This time they come in first - it's great, but they also ranked first in their preliminary round the fall before. Nicky wishes that Crosby's band had been in their round, but instead the runner up is a band fronted by a kid with red hair and a drummer that Braden knows and doesn't seem to like very much, based on the look he gives the kid when they pass backstage.

"You guys are good," the red headed kid says, grinning at them as they all file off the stage after the judges give the decision. "I'm Claude, by the way," he adds.

"Nick," Nicky says, "and Alex." He indicates Alex, standing next to him. 

"I can't wait to beat you guys next round," he says, still smiling. Nicky grins back.

"Can't wait," he echoes.

Maybe battle of the bands is fun after all.

 

  
By November, the battle is almost over and so is the semester. Nicky has managed to stop himself from staring at Alex (and Alex's mouth, and Alex's ass) every time he thinks nobody's looking. Because there's always someone looking, and that someone always seems to be Marcus, and Marcus is content to give him no end of shit over it.

By the end of November, not only is it Nicky's and Claude's bands going into the finals, but Crosby's as well. Nicky's torn - part of him is petty and doesn't want Crosby to have made it to the finals at all, but the rest of him wants to kick Crosby's ass. Which is exactly what he plans to do.

The finals are the last four bands standing out of the preliminaries, then the semi-finals, two shows on consecutive nights that cut the field from eight to four. The fourth band is fronted by a guy with the biggest, brightest smile Nicky has ever seen, who introduces himself to everyone as PK. Everyone is half in love with him every time they play, and even Nicky, absolutely besotted with Alex, is not immune to his charms. 

Everything they play is happy, bouncing - and Nicky knows he can beat them. He knows they can beat everyone but Crosby.

On the day of the final, they all meet at the school's auditorium, the venue for the final show. Up until now it's been bars and Alex's frat brothers, but now it's the actual student body filing in. It makes Nicky's stomach twist nervously to know how many people are out there.

Claude shows up alone, without the rest of his band, looking upset.

"Uh," he says to them as they gather to sort out what order the bands will be playing in. "We, uh. I have to drop out." He almost turns to back away. "Sorry."

Nicky frowns. "What happened?" Crosby asks, and Nicky thinks that's a dick move, because obviously nothing good has happened.

"Just. Stuff," Claude says, shrugging. He turns a little bit red, which isn't attractive with his red hair. He shakes his head and turns to walk away.

The rest of them sort it out, drawing straws. With Claude's band out, PK draws the shortest, meaning his band goes first. Nicky draws the longest, slotting them in last. Crosby throws him a look of irritation before walking away. The last slot is the best one, so it makes sense that Crosby would be pissed he didn't draw it.

They don't have a real dressing room, just a classroom as a designated holding area. Nicky goes back to let the rest of the band know what the order is.

"You know what happened, right?" Braden says, because of course he has the gossip. "Why Claude's not playing? Their drummer - you know, Neuvirth - was dating Gudas's sister and now she's pregnant."

"Which one's Gudas?" TJ asks. He's sitting on a desk, scuffing the toe of his sneaker across the floor.

"The bassist. The big guy," Braden says.

"Awkward," TJ adds.

"Okay, well, that's a distraction we can talk about later," Nicky says.

"All business, all the time,"' Alex says, grinning at him.

"Yeah, well, I don't want to lose to Crosby," Nicky says. "We get four songs and we're last. We have to blow everyone away."

"Look," Alex says. "We gonna win. And then we gonna go get drunk at bonfire."

Tradition dictates that Alex's frat hosts a massive party after the end of the battle of the bands, which involves them lighting a fire in the back yard. Several of the previous brothers were engineering students and had dug out and built a fire pit, and Alex is nothing if not a stickler for tradition. The previous year, the party had been subdued after their loss, but this year it's going to be different.

Nicky is determined it will be different.

 

  
There's a ten minute lull between their last song and the announcement of the winner, while the host goes on stage and asks the audience to cheer their loudest for their favorite band, then they all crowd back on stage. Alex stands too close to Nicky and reaches out and grips his hand, hiding their locked hands behind them. It makes Nicky's mouth go dry, and his vision is blurred by the lights. He knows that all of Alex's frat brothers are out there, even if he can't see their faces.

Alex is squeezing all of the feeling out of his hand. He's been calm the entire time, and Nicky would still think he was if he could feel his own fingers.

They win.

Nicky looks at Alex, struck dumb. Alex loosens his hand and grabs Nicky by the shoulders, yelling right in his face, before kissing Nicky right on the mouth, big and smacking and wet.

He stares at Alex, eyes wide and confused, and Alex grins at him then turns and does the same thing to TJ. He almost gets Braden as well, but Braden sees him coming and manages to alter the trajectory to be his cheek, rather than his mouth. Nicky feels hot all over.

The rest of the ceremony is a blur. There's a big novelty check and some paperwork and they meet and talk to a lot of people. Nicky vaguely hears Alex and Braden inviting the other guys back to the party. Crosby actually shakes their hands and congratulates them, even though he'd been a dick about everything before.

"Next year," Crosby yells to him over the noise. Nicky looks at him for a moment, then nods.

It seems like it takes longer to load the equipment when there's a party waiting for them to arrive. Well, the party is mostly at the auditorium, since Alex told his frat brothers that if they weren't at the show, they weren't allowed any beer, which is apparently a very serious threat to a house full of frat bros. TJ had looked scandalized when he told Nicky about it, and TJ doesn't even live there.

The party is in full swing by the time they get all of their equipment unloaded back at the house. Nicky goes upstairs to wash the sweat off his face from the show, and then back downstairs to find a beer. By the time he gets there, Braden is already lining up beer pong opponents alongside his German roommate, and Carlson is sunk onto the couch with TJ on his lap and TJ's hands in his hair as they make out enthusiastically.

Nicky walks out the back door, looking for Alex. He's talking animatedly with one of the guys from Crosby's band - a big Russian guy whose name Nicky can't remember - and one of the pledges. Alex spots him and waves him over.

"Nicky! We win!" he bellows into Nicky's face. The last time Alex yelled into Nicky's face, he kissed him, and thinking about it makes Nicky feel hot all over. He knows it wasn't real, because if it was Alex wouldn't have turned around and kissed TJ and tried for Braden. Nicky wants it to be real.

"We did," Nicky says, with significantly less enthusiasm. He thinks his face is red, but hopes that Alex can't tell.

"You don't sound happy," he says.

"I'm happy," Nicky says, and fakes a smile.

"You don't look happy," Alex says, making a face. Nicky can imagine what his face looks like with his fake smile.

"I just need more beer," Nicky says.

"Come on," Alex says. He reaches out and his fingers brush against Nicky's arm.

"You kissed me," Nicky says. "Before."

"Yeah," Alex says. "You want me to do again?"

Nicky takes a deep breath, and thinks about the note Marcus left on the setlist months ago, and all the shit he's given Nick since then.

"Only if you mean it," Nicky says. Alex laughs.

"I meant it first time," Alex says. "Thought you were freaking out." 

"Oh," Nicky says, exhaling the words as Alex leans in. It's a different kiss than when they were on stage. It's gentle, but with no less excitement. Alex kisses him until someone wolf whistles at them and Nicky pulls away, ducking his head and blushing.

"Fuck off," Alex says, and Nicky looks up to see Braden grinning at them, his arm looped around the shoulders of his girlfriend, who is also grinning.

"It's about time," Braden says. "I just won so much money from Kuzya. He was so sure that you two would never sort your shit out."

"You split winnings with us. We win it for you!" Alex protests. Nicky reaches out and slips his hand into Alex's.

"Absolutely not," Braden says. "I'm gonna take Brandi out to a nice dinner thanks to you idiots."

"Hope you lose all your beer pong games from now on. Come on," Alex says, turning to Nicky. "We get away from rude frat boy."

"So I'm going back to the dorm?" Nicky asks, grinning.

"So mean to me, Nicky," Alex says, and leads him into the house and up the stairs.

The party going on means that the upstairs is mostly deserted, frat brothers leaving locked doors to make sure that no one uses their beds for fun.

"What kind of boy do you think I am?" Nicky asks as Alex leads him up the stairs.

"Kind of boy to sit in quiet place and talk about feelings," Alex says, still grinning at him even as he's unlocking his bedroom door.

Alex shares his room with Kuznetsov, and apparently with the party going on Alex expected that Kuznetsov would be at the party. What actually happens, is someone in the dark bedroom starts yelling in Russian as soon as the door opens. Alex yells something back, then jerks the door closed.

"So, Kuzya in bedroom," Alex tells him.

"I gathered," Nicky says.

"And he not alone," Alex continues.

"Uh huh," Nicky says.

"And he say to me, why don't you knock," Alex says. "And I say, because this my room too!"

The door whips open again and Kuznetsov is standing there, shirtless and barefoot. "You supposed to be at party!" Kuznetsov yells at them. "If I know you barge in, we would go back to dorm room!"

"Maybe we will anyway," says the other person in the room, who Nicky realizes is, oh god, actually Marcus, his hair messy and his mouth red.

"No, we'll go," Nicky says, grabbing hold of Alex's hand and tugging on it.

"Wait," Kuznetsov says, narrowing his eyes at them. "Why you come in here anyway?"

"Uh," says Alex, and he almost looks guilty. Almost.

"Oh man," says Marcus, a note of glee in his voice. "You owe Holts so much money."

"Shut up, I never take you on date again," Kuznetsov says, turning on Marcus and pushing at him gently. Marcus is laughing as Kuznetsov swings the door shut.

"How long has that been going on?" Nicky asks.

"Since beginning of semester?" Alex says, shrugging. He and Nicky head back down the stairs.

"I take back what I said about Jojo not being sneaky. I had no idea," Nicky says, feeling a little stunned. They're roommate's, and Nicky can't believe he didn't know. Or that Marcus never said anything. "So when he wasn't coming back to the room - "

"He here, yeah. I crash in Holts' room because he stay with Brandi," Alex says.

"Huh," Nicky says.

"Maybe you just not observant," Alex says.

"I am plenty observant," Nicky protests.

"You not notice this," Alex says. Nicky isn't sure what he's indicating. He frowns. "Me."

"I noticed you," Nicky says. He follows Alex through the house and out onto the front porch, which is cold and empty with everyone inside either partying, or in the back yard with the bonfire. "Jojo told me that I should make a move months ago."

"Could have," Alex says, agreeable. "Didn't."

"I didn't want to fuck things up," Nicky says. "I wanted us to win."

"And now we win, so is okay to fuck things up?" Alex asks, raising an eyebrow.

"I don't want to," Nicky says. "But yes, maybe we can take that chance."

"Okay," Alex says.

Nicky reaches out and hooks his arm around Alex's waist, then leans in to kiss him. Alex's fingers are cold on Nicky's skin where his hands slip just under the edge of Nicky's shirt. It's too cold to stay long, and Alex kisses him until Nicky's fingers start to go numb.

"Should go back," Alex finally says. Nicky nods.

Later, the party starts to wind down and the fire burns out, and Alex hesitates because he isn't sure if his room is occupied or not.

"You could come with me," Nicky says.

"Yeah?" Alex says. His keys are still in his pocket.

"I'm still not that kind of boy," Nicky tells him, smiling. "But it's somewhere to sleep where your roommate isn't fooling around. Probably. I hope?"

Alex laughs, and they hold hands walking down the sidewalk to the car.


End file.
